When looking back at the Wild West movies, we envision the “showdown” between the “good” guy in the white hat and the “bad guy” — the man in black.

These two squared off against each other as the townspeople took cover and watched. Then, in an effort to resolves some personal slight or deep-seated conflict, the duel would ensue, the good guy would draw quicker and the best man (quickest draw) would “win.”

But that’s not what happened in the Trayvon Martin case.

He was unarmed. It was not a “duel.”

The so-called “stand your ground” statute of self-defense supposedly allows the armed resident about town (or in his home) to not have to run in retreat when confronted by an armed hoodlum with hostile intent — therefore the accosted victim was allowed to show a firearm, and use it if necessary, thus the “shoot first and ask questions later” that became a sanctioned option, when retreat (whenever possible) was the prior standard of conduct.

This was not a case of two men facing each other down. It was a case of a kid walking home from the store, arousing ethnically biased suspicion in the mind of a self-appointed neighborhood watch “captain” with an itchy trigger finger.

I don’t believe — after listening to all of the 911 “evidence” on the TV and radio — that this is a case of Martin attacking Zimmerman. The aural evidence doesn’t support that supposition.

But even if Martin only “scuffled” with this big, strange man demanding to know what he was doing in his neighborhood, the use of deadly force wasn’t warranted because Martin was unarmed and Zimmerman was carrying a concealed (?) weapon.

A policeman would have threatened to shoot, not “shoot first and ask questions later”; if that failed, then he would have only shot to disable — not to kill.

Some will say, “But Zimmerman was not a trained policeman!”

Precisely!

Zimmerman should not have been playing policeman. He was told not to, yet did so anyway with deadly results.

These laws need to be repealed, for they have created open season on young black males whose only “offense” is “walking while black.”

Otto Warmbier was arrested in January 2016 at the end of a brief tourist visit to North Korea. He had been medically evacuated and was being treated at the University of Cincinnati Medical Center when he died at age 22.